Vonnegut's talent for making us laugh, even "at this crisis in our history", is ubiquitous.

His criticisms toward the current war on Iraq are accentuated through the humanity and morality of two great Americans, Mark Twain and Abraham Lincoln. Both "...made the American people laugh at themselves and appreciate really important, really moral jokes." This propensity for self-awareness resonates all the way through this pamphlet as Vonnegut discusses the present war. Price: £2.00

"When asked for a message of support to the first Convention of END (European Nuclear Disarmament) Kurt Vonnegut sent the text of this pamphlet, with this letter...

I'm sorry to have been such a slovenly responder to your good letters. I can't come to Brussels in July, but the world seems to be one big city now. I ran into the Mayor of Nagasaki, whose mother was pregnant with him when the bomb was dropped, only this afternoon - two hundred yards from my doorstep. As it turns out, he is for peace. Surprise.

I, a druid, preached for peace at the Episcopal Cathedral here, St. John the Divine, two Sundays ago. I enclose a copy of what I said, more or less. If anything in it is of any use to you, please help yourself. The copyright is owned by the Cathedral, which paid me zero. They wouldn't have the balls to sue, no matter what you did."